|
Post by bobc on Apr 21, 2015 8:17:28 GMT -5
I agree with HB on this one, almost down to the letter. That being said, I believe Colossus could possibly take down the Thing, but probably not Iron Man, since Iron Man has so many toys.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Apr 14, 2015 8:45:16 GMT -5
Underdog Lady!!! I love her!!! Is she still around?
Listen--with all the chaos and confusion going on at Marvel over the past decade or so, it's hard to answer any question about any character. But if we are talking about back in the day when there was cohesion and you could actually tell what was what, I would say that the Thing and She Hulk were about even in the strength department. I say this because SH is a female version of the male Hulk, and thus had pretty much 80% or so of the Hulk's strength (the approximate difference in human male vs female strength). That being said, it has been established that SH does get stronger when she is angry, so who knows what her upper limits are? I will say I liked SH being in the FF--she was one of the few replacements I actually liked over the years.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Mar 30, 2015 10:33:13 GMT -5
That is an astute observation, Bongsy. I didn't even notice that none of the characters were the originals. I'm really enjoying the new Captain America book, it's really well written, but I wish it was a Falcon series. The other characters, who have known the real CA for decades, call Sam Wilson "Cap"--and that just seems jarring to me.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Mar 29, 2015 11:54:14 GMT -5
Uhhh--that is Ms. Marvel? Boy am I out of it.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Mar 29, 2015 11:53:32 GMT -5
Hmmmm--we shall see. I'd be all for a smaller Avengers team, except for the fact that there is already so much confusion due to the fact that there are currently like 100,000 "Avengers" running around. I mean seriously, who isn't an Avenger at this point? It's pretty obvious that Marvel doesn't care about continuity--in fact they are clearly against it and have been for at least a decade. Comic creators just careen from one special event to the next. I'll be the first to admit that keeping track of fifty plus years of continuity probably isn't possible anymore, but in my perfect little dream world I'd have kept the Avengers down to something like 40 or maybe 50 elite characters, and juggle them around when things needed to be spiced up. I guess my thinking is going to have to change. The old days are long over.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Mar 3, 2015 9:57:09 GMT -5
It's all marketing. I am at the point in "The History of Marvel Comics" where they talk about the Liefeld/MacFarlane/Lee years and how Marvel started doing reboots and gimmicky covers and every off--shoot of the X-Men they could dream up. All of it was a cynical attempt to get neo-collectors to think they were purchasing issues that would be worth hundreds of dollars in a short amount of time. Of course none of that stuff turned out to be worth anything and after a while the gimmicky crap stopped selling. That being said, I read that Liefeld auctioned off some original art from the X-Men and got $39,000 for it. I think I'm going to kill myself.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Feb 1, 2015 18:37:24 GMT -5
That's hilarious, HB--the poor kid probably doesn't have the miles on him to get the joke about Spinal Tap! It's one of my favorite movies. "Giant mudflaps, my baby's got 'em!" Man they just don't write love ballads like that anymore!
HB--I was really just giving myself crap about being naive. I enjoyed Secret Wars, cynically conceived or not! I also learned from that book that the only reason one of my favorite characters, the She-Hulk, was created in the first place was because Marvel thought the producers of "The Hulk" TV show were going to create a female version of the Hulk--and they'd therefore have the copyright! The guy who wrote the first issue remarked that the first She Hulk issue was "really nothing." I guess all legends have feet of clay!
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 31, 2015 17:05:12 GMT -5
Yeah it's Avengers World--but I had to go look to figure out which of the 10,000 current Avengers titles it was. I like Valkyrie too--she is another character who has been criminally overlooked over the years. I agree that the art is pretty good, particularly the coloring. That one panel where Stingray dives into water is really beautifully colored. But who is this Bloodstone woman? I never heard of her before.
HB--yes it is the Howe book.I just read the part about how Secret Wars was only concocted to sell action figures, and was named Secret Wars because some ad research agency discovered that the words "War" and "Secret" made kids go nuts! MY GOD I was naive-going-on-stupid as a kid! I had no idea how much of Marvel's output over the years was so cynically conceived!
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 30, 2015 8:44:08 GMT -5
That's a good question, HB. The book is at home and I'm at work--I don't know.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 29, 2015 16:35:26 GMT -5
Starry--I am at the point in "History of Marvel Comics" where Jim Shooter, in the mid/late 80's handed down a decree that he wanted all stories to be wrapped up in one or two issues--because he thought new readers were having trouble getting oriented to Marvel comics. What the hell happened? What's really strange to me, is that people today have the attention spans of hummingbirds and yet comics have gotten consistently longer, more drawn out, and complicated. Now Doctor Doom has his own NEW set of Avengers.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 29, 2015 16:25:43 GMT -5
Tom--my view on it is pretty much identical. I think the slow burn between T'Challa and Namor has been phenomenal--but seriously, did it really need to take something like 3 years to tie up? I also like how Sam and Roberto have been written--but they actually speak so few times across this 3 year period that sometimes I forgot they were even around. I think when Hickman introduced the Chinese team, he really went over the edge. Now we have Avengers, a new Chinese group, all the alien groups, New Avengers, Secret Avengers, alternate Avengers, Uncanny Avengers and God only knows what else. Is anyone, at this point, NOT an Avenger? I stopped reading X-Men two decades ago because there were just so many X-Men, how could you possibly care much about any of them? It was easy to care when it was just Storm, Peter, Kurt, Logan and Scott. They waited a while to introduce Kitty, so there was time to actually get to know the others first, so that was cool.
By the way, I am now officially the dumbest poster on this forum. After my last tiresome tirade about shoddy art coming out of Marvel--today I purchased Secret Avengers without opening the book and looking at the art. What a big dope! The art is like a child with ADD drew it. I am not exaggerating.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 26, 2015 16:54:47 GMT -5
So as not to get too old manny, Jerome Opena is one of the most gifted artists I have ever seen. Please tell me he's popular. If he isn't, don't tell me--I can only take so much.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 26, 2015 16:51:18 GMT -5
Yu is a favorite new artist? Are you serious? Man. This is like bizzaro world to me. On the other hand, the biggest star in the world is Kim Kardashian so I suppose it makes sense in a twisted sort of way.
By the way, where is George Perez today? Anybody know?
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 26, 2015 10:38:47 GMT -5
HB--there are some stellar artists around. Opena, Finch and others are doing fantastic stuff. It just seems like you have a handful of those guys, but a legion of artists who don't understand basic human anatomy, perspective and all of that. There is also a profound laziness in the mix--a while ago I bought one of the Avengers titles and the artist made easily 1/4 of his character drawings blackened silhouettes. He didn't even bother drawing faces in most of the panels (I'm not talking background crowd non-faces, I'm talking about characters in the foreground). This is flat out laziness. Compare this to, say, George Perez's highly detailed work, or John Buscema's incredibly expressive facial expressions and body language. I threw that issue of Avengers in the trash. The aforementioned She Hulk is another great example of lazy art, and the colorist is really, really weak.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 23, 2015 16:00:39 GMT -5
Starry--you took the words right out of my mouth. She Hulk is a stellar example of how Marvel is allowing really, really shoddy artists in. For me not to buy a book with her and Hellcat in it, based on the art, is really saying something. I was dumb enough a few months ago to buy a couple of issues of New Avengers without looking inside just because I loved the storyline--only to find some of the stiffest, laziest art I've ever seen. Thank God those artists seem to have been just fill in artists, but following Opena's amazing, stellar art--well, these amateurish are like a bucket of cold water to the face. Especially for $5 a pop.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 22, 2015 9:10:03 GMT -5
I know whatcha mean, HB. Lately I throw down 3 comics and the bill is about $15. The thing that rankles me is when I pay that kind of money and get art that looks like garbage. I mean I have seen some really, really bad art of late. There are times I seriously wonder if Marvel even cares about the quality of the product they are putting out but I will say lately it's been much better--at least in the Avengers.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 21, 2015 9:24:06 GMT -5
Starry--the New Avengers aren't the Bendis' New Avengers. It's a totally different comic. The art has been fantastic most of the time (with several glaring exceptions) and the writing, while slow, is coming together and one major plotline is being resolved. That's all I'm gonna say on that.
I think all the Avengers comics have come around. I think the ghost of Bendis is dissipating.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 19, 2015 16:37:57 GMT -5
Has anyone here read Avenger's #40? It is a jaw-dropper and I haven't felt that way about an ending to a comic since that Avengers issue when the Reaper asked the Vision to help him "destroy the Avengers" and the Vision simply said "Yes."
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Jan 12, 2015 16:24:41 GMT -5
I like this quote from one of the GOTG fans:
"It's like if I tried to write a sequel to No Country For Old Men without actually watching the film."
I hate to tell the fan this, but everything Bendis writes is as if nothing came before him. He ignores continuity, IMO, because he thinks he's so much better than all the writers before him that he just throws their work into the garbage. The arrogance is just unbelievable. I wised up and stopped buying New Avengers very early on (when B was on it) but somebody on this forum told me that Hawkeyes just comes back as some z lister who suddenly fights with swords. Is that supposed to be intriguing? I think it sucks, and I think Bendis sucks. If I hear one more person say "But didn't you see his Daredevil run?" I will hurl myself from the nearest sky scraper! As if that one storyline makes the next two decades of garbage good. I think he is the worst thing that ever happened to Marvel. By far.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Dec 30, 2014 8:23:45 GMT -5
John B and the Black Panther! YES!!
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Dec 28, 2014 13:01:09 GMT -5
Merry Christmas, all! Thanks for the compliments, guys. Sharky I recently added the drawings of Dr Strange and the Black Panther/White Gorilla to my site so you probably never saw them before. Medusa is on the way!
HB you are so right about artistic types trying to run things! We had a guy at a prior company who campaigned relentlessly to be the Lead Artists on a project. He got the job (mostly because nobody else wanted it) and he was absolutely pitiful. He was one of these angry-at-the-world, faux communist artsy types that works better at some cutting edge coffee shop than a real workplace. His managerial style was that there were no managers!! Everybody was "equal" (whatever that means)and no one was allowed to voice any opinions on any art! There was no direction and likewise the game never came close to shipping. This "Lead Artist" would throw a tantrum anytime anyone dared to suggest he lead the team!
Sharky I don't do comics because I think that initial experience really soured me on the whole idea. I'd want to write as well as draw too. You know what's weird is that I wrote my Avengers story (The one on my site--those are just the first few pages) years before Bendis came along but he ended up killing Hawkeye and making Wanda mega powerful--two things Bendis did later. OH GOD--comparing myself to Bendis is an incredible buzz kill! My Avengers story was supposed to be sort of like a "What If" title--not part of any continuity. I'd never kill off Hawkeye in a real Avengers book.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Dec 23, 2014 15:18:36 GMT -5
Hi Sharky No wonder I liked Buckler's work--not all of it, I found him to be very up and down over the years. I think I liked him best when he was copying Big John! How did I meet the Art Director? I had a friend in college named Tom who was from NYC (I was from a small farm town in Upstate NY)and he had a female friend whose boyfriend worked for Marvel. Tom thought I was really good at drawing so he arranged a meeting, through his friend, with the art director whose name escapes me. I stayed with Tom for two weeks and went to the Marvel Offices in Manhattan a couple of times. What I recall most was Jim Shooter because he was really, really huge and seemed kind of nasty. The tension in that office was palpable. Everyone looked angry and the office seemed to be in chaos.I was led to believe I'd probably get to drawn Captain America, but when I went in to learn more it was like they didn't even remember I'd been there a few days prior. This was maybe 1987 or possibly '86. Anyhow, I was very young and naive and thought Marvel would be my dream job but the reality was a whole other story! Some guy just walked up to me and shoved a bunch of Fantastic Four pages that had been penciled by John Buscema (I'm wanting to say the She Hulk and Spiderman were in these pages)and informed me I'd be inking those if I wanted to, and didn't seem to know I was told I'd do Captain America. The whole thing was a mess and I hated NYC anyway--so I moved to Austin and worked for printers and ad firms before getting into video games and 3D in 1996. I still have those John B pages somewhere--they were photo copies. I had a similar experience with Electronic Arts in California.EA flew me out to San Mateo, CA to interview for the Lead Texture Artist on a James Bond game. The way it works at EA is that you interview all day long, with like 500 people all asking you the same dumb questions. By the end of the day I was practically a zombie from answering the same questions over and over and over. But here's the weird part--from the moment I got there, everybody was talking about Lord of the Rings Return of the King, NOT James Bond, and after about two hours I finally said to one of my interviewers that I thought there had been a mistake--that I was there to talk about working on James Bond. "No no no" the guy said, like I was crazy,and assured me I'd been contacted about working on ROTK. I explained that that wasn't possible, seeing that I didn't even know they were making a ROTK game. Then I caught myself and said to myself--you idiot, you're getting offered a job on a career making game and there I was arguing to be on James Bond. After that epiphany I was very docile and just went with the flow. I got the job, by the way. Hey did I ever post a link to some of the Marvel drawings I put on my website. I don't recall. If anyone cares, go here: www.bobcooksey.net/comicillustrationIndex.htm
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Dec 19, 2014 15:08:26 GMT -5
Thanks for the info, Sharky. Back in the 80's when I was going to work for Marvel as an artist, I distinctly remember the art director (can't recall who he was) saying that people like me should not learn to draw anatomy from looking at comics. He said I should use real people as subjects. I never forgot that because frankly I had learned to draw mainly from looking at the work of artists like John Buscema (anybody recall John's book "How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way?"
Anyhow--I am reading "The History of Marvel Comics" right now and the author said that in the mid to late 60's, Stan Lee would insist that new artists learn how to draw comics by mimicking Jack Kirby. Apparently Don Heck didn't feel his art was up to Kirby's standards, so he often went to Kirby for tips on drawing. When Kirby left in 1970, John B thought Marvel would collapse without him.
Sharky--I can't tell you how shocked I am at the blatant copying! I had no idea! That being said, if you're gonna copy somebody, I'd pick Big John!
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Dec 17, 2014 8:57:04 GMT -5
Well isn't this embarrassing. This whole time (decades) I thought Rich Buckler was an underrated artist. This is just shameless! Why would you copy another artist's work? What's the point? Why not copy real human forms?
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Dec 14, 2014 14:35:33 GMT -5
Oh...my...GOD.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Dec 4, 2014 18:51:02 GMT -5
I LOVED that issue. It is one of the first Avengers comics I ever bought. The art is fantastic! Isn't this the issue that starts with the Vision sitting in a chair? He never looked cooler to me. Also--the artists made the black Panther look very catlike and powerful. This may have been the issue that sparked a lifelong love of this book.
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Nov 1, 2014 10:04:59 GMT -5
Yeah that makes sense. Thanks, Waspy!
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Oct 29, 2014 9:03:27 GMT -5
Thanks for the info but good lord what a mess. I noticed on the meme that's going around regarding the upcoming Marvel movies that Ant-man isn't even on it. I have no idea what that means, if anything, but all this confusion doesn't seem very promising. I always remind myself that for every great X-Men or Avengers movie, there's been a craptastic Daredevil or FF movie so as to not get my hopes too high. But anyway, I'm with you 100% about the Wasp. I don't want anybody but Janet in that role--in fact, I'd rather see Hank Pym than Scott Lang in the lead role. I'm old school.
On another front, I am really happy that the Dr Strange movie is finally on its way (I think he is a character that has been criminally underutilized), and I'm equally stoked about the Inhumans movie. I also just read that the Black Panther is going to debut in the next Captain America movie! YES!!!
Winning...
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Oct 28, 2014 15:19:08 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by bobc on Oct 28, 2014 15:17:50 GMT -5
Well, Hank Pym without Janet is an abomination, IMO. I doubt you'd find many Marvel fans who'd disagree with that--and who is Hope Pym?
|
|